1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to machines which vend or dispense a product (or grant entry) upon the insertion of at least two disks (e.g. coins) of a desired size. It appears to be especially suitable to be used to convert a mechanical coin rejector from a single quarter coin actuator into a fifty cent coin actuator.
2. Description of the Art
In one type of a widely used coin rejector, inserting a single coin in the coin rejector mechanically disables a blocking means and allows the customer to rotate an external handle. See e.g. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,028,049, 3,604,547, 3,756,336 and 3,822,004. This type of prior art actuator/rejector is designed to prevent insertion of any coin which is larger than the desired coin, and to reject coins which are too small.
With such systems, when it is necessary to increase the price of vending (e.g. due to inflation or to a change of merchandise), one usually has to replace the entire actuator. Some systems have been tried which require the public to sequentially insert coins into multiple slots. However, the public does not readily understand these multiple slot systems. There is therefore a need for an improved way to modify single coin actuators to accept multiple coins.